Burried Deeper than Six Feet
by Rusty Fingers
Summary: An abduction of one of the Vegas team throws the strength of Horatio's character into sharp focus for Grissom, only to have that ripped away by the revelation of some of Horatio's past deeds. Slash. Follows 'The Things You Thought You Knew'.
1. Chapter 1

Don't own 'em, any of 'em. Beware, this story makes mention of two fellas liking each other.

This is a nod to everyone who gave positive feedback over the last, what, year is it now? I have quite a story planned out for these two if I can ever find the time and impetus to write it. So thanks for the support, it helps get the new ones off the brain shelf.

Most of the comments have been about not being able to see these two together until reading this series and there's a good reason for that. I write Horatio here a little out of current character, mostly because I still see him as he was in the first few seasons: intense, caring, still as much of a scientist as a cop. I don't think Grissom would ever go for the Horatio that seemed to crop up in the last few seasons.

I'm not a huge fan of rewriting stories the show has already done but some of them need to be worked in to build up to later events(or to lead to current events as is the case here). Enjoy.

~~~~#~~~~

The Caine household was a fairly happy place that weekend. Kyle had been invited to spend the time with his father and his lover and had chosen to take them up on it. Horatio and Grissom were enjoying it. The stress of work and family seemed to subside as they learned more about the teenager in their midst and generally goofed around. Grissom could forget about his fractured team back home and how he hadn't worked with Catherine, Warrick or Nick in months. Almost, just almost, he could forget about how much he missed them when he was doing nothing important with his lover and his son.

That was why they were all three exiting go-carts at the moment, perspiration on their foreheads from the helmets, laughing.

"That was so sick," Kyle said breathlessly, his short blond hair askew.

Horatio reached up and smoothed the errant strands just to have them stick back up. "Seems you're a natural."

"There will, of course, be a rematch." Grissom said, looking seriously at Kyle before a smile split his face.

"I don't think that would be so fair to dad." Kyle said, before ducking from a swipe from his father that didn't come.

Horatio just shook his head. "Pride...is the sign of a foolish man, son."

They sat down at a table in the snack bar and started to look through menus when Grissom's phone rang. He was slow in getting it out and saw that he had missed a call from Catherine.

Horatio looked questioningly at him.

Grissom shrugged and put his phone away. "Catherine. She'll leave a message."

Eyes returned to badly printed menus but again, a phone rang. Horatio pulled it out and frowned before looking up to Grissom and handing it to him.

Grissom saw that it was Catherine's number again and quickly flipped open the phone, pressing it to his ear. "Catherine?" His voice was calm, hiding a pang of panic that immediately arose.

Horatio and Kyle watched his face darken.

"Damn," he breathed, "I'm going to the airport now. Let me call you back in five minutes."

Horatio noted the increased movements of Grissom's chest beneath his shirt, the slight tremor in his hand as he handed back the phone.

"Nick was abducted from a scene 20 minutes ago." Grissom said as he rose.

Horatio rose with him. "Abducted?"

"Can you drive me to the airport?" The look that passed between the two was intense. Their minds were in the same places right now, there was no real need to speak.

"Come on Kyle, let's go," Horatio said, following Grissom towards the exit. The teenager didn't ask questions. just followed obediently. It didn't take a genius to notice the shift in atmosphere when that phone call happened. He'd seen his dad change like that a few times. It was interesting to see Grissom react similarly.

Horatio drove, Grissom fired clipped questions into his phone as he jotted notes on the pad of paper that lived in the car's glove box. Kyle sat in the back and kept his mouth shut. The time for questions, he knew, would be after Grissom was on a plane.

Once in the airport, Horatio went immediately to the ticket desk as Grissom was still on the phone. It took a flash of his badge but the process went quickly. The badge came out once more when security insisted that He and Kyle not be allowed through to wait with Grissom and quiet, terse words were exchanged. They were let through, Grissom still on his phone.

"You okay?" Horatio asked Kyle, giving him that calm, steadying gaze.

Swallowing, Kyle nodded. "Yeah. Is everything gonna be okay?"

"It's going to be fine." He squeezed Kyle's shoulder before turning back to Grissom, finally off the phone. "What do we know?"

Grissom shook his head, jaw clenched and eyes narrow. "Next to nothing. What they did find...I don't think it's good."

Boarding was announced and they stood. Both men held each other tightly.

"I'll follow as soon as I can," Horatio whispered into Grissom's ear. He didn't respond, just nodded into Horatio's neck, rough hairs on tender skin.

Grissom looked over Horatio's shoulder as they parted, fixing Kyle with the same respectful gaze he'd worn when they met, tinged though it was with worry. "Rematch?"

"Totally," he replied quietly, adams apple bobbing.

"Hang in there," Horatio called after his lover. A quick flash of grey eyes over a shoulder and he was gone.

Horatio looked after him, thinking for a moment that this 'here and gone' game they were being forced to play was getting tiresome. Sighing, he looked back at Kyle who smiled the reassuring smile of a child back at him.

The fact that Grissom essentially did the same job as his father had come up and Kyle now learned about some of the people Grissom worked with. One of them was named Nick and he was missing, taken while on assignment.

"I'm going to go to Vegas as soon as I've made sure the lab is taken care of," Horatio said once they were back home. He was packing Grissom's suit case. He fixed Kyle with a level stare. "Are you going to be okay?"

Kyle sat on the bed and nodded his head vigorously. "Yeah, you should go. Um, will you let me know when...well, when you know something."

His father knelt infront of him and placed his hands around Kyle's jaw. "I'll let you know when I am coming home, okay? And I am going to have Yelina come and check on you." This was not ideal, Horatio had to admit to himself. His son was sensitive to him being gone for any period of time, easily noticeable by how he showed up on the doorstep for a sleepover if he hadn't seen Horatio in a while. There was progress made these last two days and Horatio would have preferred it not end with Kyle being abandoned.

He knew, looking into those blue eyes, that that was exactly Kyle's fear but the boy stiffened his upper lip. "I don't need to be checked up on."

Horatio leaned his head a bit to one side. "I know that...I'm going to do it for me, okay? I want to make sure you're doing all right."

Before he walked out the door, Kyle wrapped his father in a death grip, squeezing hard in an effort to avoid tears. No words were spoken, just that hug passed between them for a while before they parted, Horatio putting his palm to his son's cheek one last time.


	2. Chapter 2

When he arrived, the lab was eerily quiet and Horatio had to try a few doors before he found a face he knew.

"Horato." Catherine's voice was surprised but steady.

"Catherine." His look was sympathetic and she smiled wanly back. "I'm here to help."

She shook her head. "I'd say help is what we've got in spades right now. What we need is a solid lead."

"I understand. Would you-" He was cut off by the sound of scuffling, like a fight between a boy and girl, both about the age of five.

Both CSI's moved quickly, Horatio with his hand on his gun, toward the lobby and the source of the sound. He recognized the annoying trace tech who was playing tug of war with a delivery boy. They were joined simultaneously by Grissom and the rest of the team, spilling out from different rooms. Nick, Horatio felt, was conspicuously absent.

After a bit of confusion, Grissom snapped on his gloves and peered at the parcel, so engrossed he hadn't noticed Horatio's presence. He left them all in the hall as he examined the manilla bubble envelope, first tactilely, then slitting it open and using the ALS. The source of the quiet became immediately apparent standing there with the four CSI's. They barely breathed.

Entering the lab where Grissom worked like kids who had missed first bell, they stood around the table and listened to the blank space on the tape before it played. Horatio recognized the song and frowned. Catherine was right. He was trying to get under their skin and when Grissom clicked 'watch', Horatio knew the bastard had succeeded.

Horatio had come to learn something about the way Grissom acted when he was upset which was, if you could get him shouting, everything would be fine. When he failed to loose control and simply shut down, there was trouble on the horizon. Lips parted, eyes dark behind his glasses, still as death, Grissom was a picture of himself at his most upset.

The rest of the team showed more obvious signs of distress and Horatio knew that Grissom's sole thought was the keeping of his team focused so they could find Nick; So they could be complete again and that pressure was squarely on Grissom's shoulders.

He didn't stare at the picture for long, moving instead to calculate how much air his CSI had which got everyone else thinking about practical problems. The sight of their friend in a box, underground and panicking being more than most anyone could cope with.

~~~~#~~~~

After Sara and Warrick filled him in, Horatio ducked outside to finally greet his lover. Grissom was standing just outside a sitting room and Horatio could see he was trying to steady himself. Reaching out, he couldn't deny the pang of hurt when Grissom stepped away from his touch, instead fixing Horatio with eyes that looked black in the gloom of the lab at night.

"I need to focus," he said simply. There was no regard for Horatio's feelings or his own. That side of Grissom was effectively closed until further notice.

His jaw worked a moment. "The city won't finance the ransom." Again, words spoken with no emotion even thought they could be a death sentence.

Horatio looked to the floor, hands on his hips. "That's not surprising."

Grissom pursed his lips, frown deepening. "It probably wouldn't make a difference anyway I just...wish we had one more card up our sleeves." He paused, looking Horatio over. "I need your eyes."

Shoving that hurt feeling away down deep, Horatio made certain it didn't reach his face as he nodded. "You've got them. I'll start with the photos from the scene."

Grissom kept his eyes on the blue pools, loosing some of their lustre in this light, a moment longer before turning abruptly and pushing open the door.

Horatio watched him through the glass a moment before walking back to the layout where the feed of Nick was stationed. He opened his laptop and flipped open his cell, making contact with his financial advisor and bank. Luckily, he was a fantastic customer otherwise they wouldn't put up with the late night calls they had received from Horatio on more than one occasion. His focus didn't waiver from this task even as Nick's parents entered with Catherine and Grissom.

When it was just he and Grissom in the room, Horatio cleared his throat and walked towards him. "I can have fifty thousand here by 5am."

Grissom, shaken jarringly from all his current, pressing thoughts, stared blank facedly at Horatio.

Horatio looked briefly back at his laptop, hands on his hips. "I can double that in a day."

This didn't quite have the desired effect as Grissom's composure threatened to break. He shook his head a little. "That's..."he shook his head again. "We don't have enough, one way or another." His mouth was parted just so, a thank you and so much more on the tip of his tongue before his face darkened again. "Please just have a look at the photos."

Horatio nodded and returned to the table, pushing aside his laptop and opening files of photos. Grissom allowed himself one precious moment to look at the handsome figure of his lover before his gaze drifted to Nick. He pulled up a seat opposite Horatio and lifted the evidence bag containing the coffee cup.

Horatio had never seen someone stare so intently at something seemingly so meaningless.

When Catherine entered some time later with a duffel and plunked it in front of Grissom, the ensuing conversation would have made Horatio laugh under any other circumstances. She was always telling her former supervisor to be more politic and here he was, spelling it all out for her.

Horatio's mind emptied, however, when Grissom said he would make the drop and he stood up before thinking. She sound of his stool scraping on linoleum drew Catherine and Grissom's attention to him.

But what could he say? Don't do it? There was no one else that line would sound more hypocritical coming from than himself, Horatio knew. If it were one of his team, he would walk into anything for them and few knew that better than Grissom.

"I'm coming with you." His gravelly tone was firm.

"No, you're not." Grissom eyed him over the rims of his glasses, his voice calculating. "He'll ask for one person and this whole thing could go south if we don't give him exactly what he wants."

"And if what he wants is to take another member of this lab down?" Horatio placed his hands on his hips, cocking his head slightly to the side.

Catherine took a step back from the table, eyes raised but avoiding the two men.

"We've got to assume he's after the ransom." Grissom stood and picked up the bag. "Our focus is on getting Nick back and if this is our opportunity then so be it."

Sharing a brief look, Catherine and Horatio followed Grissom out.

A mile from the drop a caravan of police cruisers, tactical response units and paramedics were parked under the baking Nevada sun. Standing out back of his Denali, Grissom had a bullet proof vest handed to him by Catherine which he promptly threw into the SUV. Removing his holster, Grisom found Horatio's hand on his with an iron grip. He looked up.

"Don't be stupid." Horatio held onto Grissom's hand like he held onto his gaze. Here, there was no argument for the Vegas supervisor to make. Horatio would not let him.

Slipping his holster back into his belt, he turned from his lover and got in the Denali. Hands on his hips, a frown beneath his sunglasses, Horatio stood in the dust kicked up with Catherine beside him. He felt sick watching the SUV getting smaller and smaller. This was a nightmare, literally the fabric from which his night terrors were woven.

~~~~#~~~~

Catherine paced. Horatio leaned against the door of the Denali they had both arrived in, arms crossed over his chest, barely breathing.

His mother had been catholic but Horatio had been uncertain about the faith as a child and had outright abandoned it in his teens. He believed in hope and well wishing, but not praying. All he had to do right now was play out the last things he had said to his lover, his partner. There were few things that bothered him more than doing nothing. In his mind, a great many evils could have been prevented if someone had simply done or said something. Inaction, if he believed in sin, would be a big one.

When the sound of the blast came ricochetting off of the hills around them, Horatio was in the drivers seat so fast he had to wait for Catherine before speeding off, at the head of the snake of vehicles. Skidding to a stop, he was out with his gun drawn before anyone else had gotten there. He didn't wait for Catherine as he charged into the building, exactly like the explosives expert ought not to have.

He didn't care.

"Gil?" His voice could carry when he wanted it to. In the silence following the blast, it's rough, heavy tones sounded like lead bouncing around the shell of the warehouse. He kept calling out until he saw the movement to his left when he entered the back room.

Holstering his gun as he knelt next to Grissom, Horatio said his lover's name softly as he held his head in one hand and used the other to search his body. Grissom was covered in blood but none of it appeared to be his. Shifting his focus, Horatio brought out a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the blood spatter from Grissom's face.

Grissom looked stunned and could not move his gaze from the spot where the man had been standing moments ago. His mind, addled by the explosion, was trying to fumble through too many thoughts at once. A man had just died. He himself seemed to be alive. Horatio was here. Nick. Nick. The man didn't say where Nick was. They still didn't know where Nick was.

He found himself forced to look at Horatio by strong hands on either side of his face. Not knowing it at the time, he read Horatio's lips. He couldn't hear him.

"_Are you all right? I'm gonna stand you up, okay?"_

Grissom didn't give consent, just let himself be hauled to his feet and clung to Horatio as he was half dragged from the building. There were flashing lights on the Ambulance that Horatio brought him to, but no audible siren...

Horatio's mouth was open, breathing hard from hauling 180 pounds of near dead weight. Grissom couldn't see the blue of his eyes behind his sunglasses. His hand gripped Grissom's shoulder for a moment until he was forced aside by an EMT.

Hands on his hips, he leaned over slightly as he caught his breath before looking back up to Grissom sitting in the back of the ambulance.

"He left us with nothing," Grissom said softly, his face deeply perplexed, staring into the air in front of him.

Horatio exhaled, looked back to the building, back to his lover. It was a good thing the man had blown himself up. It saved Horatio the trouble of having to hunt him down and kill him himself.


	3. Chapter 3

Not bothering with a jumpsuit, Horatio snapped on his gloves and flicked on a flash light. Holding a bin up with his hand and his hip, he began picking up bomb fragments. Copper wires sheathed in green and red plastic, end caps, paper wrapping. Being glad of his help in this area, no one questioned him and he left with his full bin an hour later, driving back to the lab. Thinking of Grissom lying in that blood, stunned and momentarily deaf, gave Horatio all the fuel he needed even though he was coming up on 10 hours of straight worry and searching.

Back at the lab, he looked in on Grissom as he sat watching Nick. The kid was doused in sweat but still alive.

Kicked to the garage for want of available counter space, Horatio laid out each component and reassembled the device. There was nothing in the construction. No hint of a twisted psychopaths brain weaving intricate patterns into their work. He swabbed the paper wrapping before tearing of his gloves and rubbing his eyes.

Leaning against the doorway of the A/V lab, staring at Grissom absent-mindedly, Horatio was shaken out of his lack of thoughts by Hodges.

"Pentaerythritol tetranitrate, cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine, styrene, butadiene and tributyl citrate." Hodges handed him a print out.

Grissom and Sara looked over their shoulders as Hodges listed off the chemicals.

"PETN and RDX in equal amounts, a binder and a plasticizer...Semtex H." Horatio sighed.

Sara raised her eyebrows. She was good at chemistry but not that good. Grissom shook his head and frowned as he turned back to the screen. He already knew what Horatio knew.

"Is that helpful?" Hodges asked hopefully.

Horatio turned icy blue eyes on him. "No."

Grissom didn't look up from the screen as Horatio stole a sip of his coffee. "Semtex, the explosive of terrorists worldwide."

"Don't leave home without it," Horatio rumbled wryly. "Got your bug yet?"

"Almost," Grissom drew out the word, watching ants move about the camera view.

An hour later, Horatio stood beside Grissom as they unearthed Nick, amazed at the barbarism some people were capable of. From what he had seen, there was not a man less deserving of this ordeal than Nick Stokes.

When Catherine cried out for everyone to leave the hole, that it was rigged with explosives, Grissom's eyes shot up to Horatio. The Miami CSI's mind formulated a logical thought based on the prototype of the plexiglass coffin he had seen and the grave before him. "Its probably rigged on pressure switches." He instinctively reached out a hand to Grissom who took it, crawling out of the hole and looking around

Grissom's mind worked with split second logic as well when he laid eyes on the earth mover sitting darkly idle a few feet from them.

He barked out orders and jumped back into the hole, causing Horatio's breathing to hitch in his chest. There was nothing for it. Grissom sat on the lid of the rigged coffin and calmed Nick down, like a father would a scared child. Horatio understood better than anyone else there. Looking down at his lover in that grave with Nick, he saw himself covered in Speedle's blood, cradling him.

He grabbed the rope right behind Grissom and heaved on his call. Catching Grissom as they were showered in dirt, he kept them both from pitching over backward.

Grissom felt strong arms steady him in the second ear shattering blast he'd been in that day. That night. What day was it again? That didn't matter. Nick.

The hospital was the kind of quiet places like hospitals and hotels get at night. It was quieter than normal but clicks and whirrs and beeps and the sounds of people trying to move soundlessly filled the air. It was background noise and Grissom couldn't hear most of it. His ears were still ringing.

He was slumped in a chair, dusty and tired eyed, looking at Nick. Looking at the welts that covered every inch of the young man's body. Looking at the IV drip that was rehydrating him. Part of him was irrationally afraid that if he looked away, Nick might not be there when he looked back. So he didn't move.

"I could stay with him. You could go catch an hour of sleep." Horatio offered from his own sentry-like position in a chair next to Grissom. Grissom had sent the team home a half hour ago, telling them he would stay. They were all dead on their feet.

It took a while, but eventually the smallest shake of Grissom's head could be discerned. "No," he croaked, "I'm not going anywhere where both of you aren't...not yet."

His sloppy sentence structure was a testament to how tired Grissom was, Horatio knew. He reached up a hand slowly, uncertainly, before he let it rest on Grissom's shoulder. It was instantly grasped and held as if for sweet life, pressed against Grissom's face as his eyes squeezed shut.

Horatio felt his own face contort as he looked at his lover. Grissom wasn't fighting tears, it was like he was crying without the moisture. Like his body was dry of them but could still shake and so that's what it did.

Strengthening his grip, Horatio met Grissom's eyes when they finally opened. The black, stone look of them was gone. His iris' were once again a soft shade of grey, so familiar to Horatio's baby blues. They leaned their heads together, both staring at Nick out of the corner of their eyes.

Catherine found them red eyed and slumped several hours later. She jerked a thumb over her shoulder at Horatio who stood to help Grissom up. She and Grissom fell into a hug when their paths crossed, so relieved, so grateful.

Then they left as Catherine sat next to Nick and picked up his hand. Horatio kept a palm on the small of Grissom's back as they walked from the hospital. After a minute spent clumsily fishing his keys out of his pocket, Grisosm had them gently stolen by Horatio who nodded towards the passenger side. Once inside, he reached over and drew Grissom's belt across his body and buckled it. The thought had slipped the Vegas supervisor's mind.

Then he drove them to Grissom's townhouse, taking it slowly. His mind had slowed down considerably from the lack of sleep too.

Grissom let himself be undressed and laid down, drawing the covers over himself being his last act of willpower before he fell asleep. Horatio stripped and climbed in next to him, in the space that Grissom would normally occupy in the bed. He brought their bodies close together, holding him from behind, one arm curled beneath his pillow while the other hand held Grissom's.

Horatio kissed his back and remembered nothing more.

Grissom was jerked awake by the feel of someone grabbing his hand. Hard. His mind drifted to the surface of consciousness and he was aware of movement in the bed, thrashing. Looking over his shoulder, fully alert now, he saw Horatio sweating and tossing about, clearly having a bad dream. Grissom sat up and over his lover, catching his hands and calling to him, trying to get him to come out of it.

He did but not before a throaty rumble of 'Speed' left his lips. Blue eyes flashed open and found Grissom above him, his face a little worried but full of love. His hand pushed aside damp red hair affectionately.

"Hey, I got you." Grissom's voice could be incredibly soft when he wanted it to. In this moment, having never seen his lover so vulnerable before, he wanted nothing more than to comfort him. Horatio's blue eyes were almost white but gradually shifted to a darker hue as his breathing became less ragged.

Leaning over, Grissom brought their lips together, softly at first. The kiss became deeper though and he shifted to be more comfortable, putting weight on one arm so he could run his other hand over Horatio's chest.

Traces of the dream, composed mostly of memories of the day he had lost Speedle, were still awash in his mind and it took Horatio a second to respond. The need that could be felt in his lover's touches was familiar and he wrapped his arms around Grissom's shoulders, letting his tongue slip to meet Grissom's.

They made love for over an hour and Horatio felt all the closeness with Grissom he had been denied in the last 40 hours. No more stone-walling.

When they finally made it out of bed, showered and dressed, Horatio set about making them something to eat. Grissom, he knew, needed to go back to work. Crimes didn't cease to happen because you had a long case, a long night or a bad day. The lab was now short a CSI.

Grissom was aware of Horatio following him out the door but said nothing. Having him in the lab would be welcome. Horatio slotted himself into the routine of the night shift flawlessly, taking up the work that Nick would normally have done. The lab was more relaxed after the incident than it otherwise would have been because of his calming presence.

Sara thought vaguely that it was like having two Grissoms around. There was always a senior CSI around to ask the bizarre questions one could only answer after more than a decade of this work. Though Horatio was not as animated as Grissom could be when explaining some obscure bit of forensic knowledge, he exuded the patience of a teacher never the less.

He also found himself playing the role of counsellor more than once. In the aftermath of the brutal crimes committed against their friend and colleague, several of the CSI's and lab techs confided their fears and uncertainties to him. It was simply the kind of person he was, one to be trusted even though you didn't truly know him.

Grissom was incredibly grateful. The chaos of the week following Nick's abduction would have been hell were it not for his lover stepping up and shouldering so much of the burden. He did it without being asked. He did more than would be required of any temporary CSI they may have thrown into the lab. Not once did he walk away from an assignment, no mater how menial, throwing rank or claiming fatigue.

They had almost no time for each other apart from quick meals and the beginning and end of their day. More than once they fell asleep on the couch, wrapped in each other's arms, awaking to find the sun setting and their entire 'night' slept away. The night shift was hard on Horatio.

Harder still was being at the airport a week later, saying goodbye again. Their hug lasted longer this time, there being no emergency to rush to. When they pulled apart, Horatio left his hands on the place where Grissom's neck met his jaw, fingertips stoking wiry curls. Grissom's hair had gotten greyer sometime between last weekend and this, Horatio noted.

"I want to see you soon," Horatio whispered.

Grissom parted his lips to breathe in as he grasped Horatio's hand and kissed it. "The department'll make me take a leave soon. I'll book a flight."

They hugged again and then Horatio slipped away into the security line up.

Grissom felt like he'd been weightless one second then thrown into normal gravity the next. He shook a little. Horatio's presence had been so strong that, finding himself without it, Grissom felt unstable.

He sat in the Denali and stared at the rows of cars about him in the airport parking lot for a long time. Both men had spent a great deal of time at airports recently. Grissom frowned as he thought about his job and his life which, really, was his job. Well, that and cockroaches.

And Horatio.

He looked up into the blue sky at this thought, leaning over the steering wheel. He thought about how Horatio's eyes were never really that shade of blue, they truly were the colour of the ocean most days. He thought about his mother's wedding ring and how she had never taken it off. Then he looked from side to side at the rows of automobiles, glinting in the early Nevada sun. He started the engine and drove.


	4. Chapter 4

Grissom fingered the small, velvet box in his pocket as he walked into work. The store had said he could come and get it any time but he couldn't wait. He skipped most of the time he would normally have slept in order to go to the store. Now it was in his pocket and he was smiling.

Smiling right up until he entered his office and found Ecklie sitting at his desk. The balding man looked up from the photo in his hand. Grissom's smile morphed into a derisive smirk.

"Find something of interest in my desk, Conrad?" He didn't bother keeping the scorn from his voice.

Ecklie looked down at the picture of Grissom dancing with Horatio again as he set it down flat on the desk and leaned back in Grissom's chair, lacing his fingers. Grissom didn't keep the picture on his desk, he kept it in the bottom left drawer, under his change of clothes. He had been waiting to find a different frame to put it in before displaying it, the one his mother had chosen being a little hard to reconcile with his foetal pig.

"I wanted to talk to you about taking your mandatory time off now that the teams are straightened out." He said it casually, smoothly.

Grissom's eyes drifted to the file infront of Ecklie, to the name on the label. "The time off is already settled. There's nothing to discuss."

A smirk lifted the corner of Ecklie's mouth. "Plane already booked, huh?"

Grissom said nothing, focusing instead on keeping his breathing level. He didn't care if Ecklie knew about Horatio, there was nothing he could do or say about it. Ecklie didn't have anything, Grissom thought, his hand tight on the little box in his pocket.

Ecklie stood and buttoned his suit jacket before picking up the folder just to toss it a foot to the other side of the desk. Under Grissom's nose.

The label read 'Lt. H. Caine'. Grissom's stomach clenched apprehensively. He had spoken to Horatio the night before, nothing could have happened to him.

"Have a read, Gil."

Grissom picked up the folder, opening it to a picture of a Hispanic man with dark, curly hair lying in a pool of blood, eyes lifeless. He flipped up the photo and scanned the information on the page beneath it. His Spanish was rudimentary but there was no mistaking the meaning of the document. Grissom swallowed and read it again.

"Seems you've got yourself quite the rogue there Gil," Ecklie said as he tucked his hands into the pockets of his slacks.

The supervisor's eyes lifted to Ecklie but he kept the shock from them. He felt himself shutting down as the words worked there way into his mind, finding the memory of Horatio dancing with his mother, laughing. His eyes narrowed at Ecklie.

"You didn't know about all of this did you?"

Hatred showed in Grissom's eyes now, there was no hiding it.

"Why would your boyfriend want to keep something like this from you if you two are so close?" Ecklie looked and sounded smug.

"Where did you get this," Grissom's brain was searching for information, trying to fit the pieces together and make this all make sense.

"It wasn't difficult to find out all about Lieutenant Caine's colourful past and it's really beside the point, isn't it Gil?"

"What is the point Conrad?" His eyes were hard, steeled.

Ecklie walked around the desk to speak his last words to Grissom before he left. "The point is...this lab does not need a loose canon like Caine around toying with it's reputation. As for who you choose to personally associate with, Gil, well...that's up to you."

Grissom looked down at the file held loosely open on his palms and a crippling sadness overcame him. He knew why Horatio hadn't told him. After the Renfrew case he had expressed regret over killing Andrew Callum, much to a stunned Horatio's surprise. In Horatio's mind justice had been served, one way or another. He lost no sleep over Callum. It had never crossed Grissom's mind that his lover would go to such lengths to get that justice, if justice it was. Horatio had known there would be no way to explain this to him.

He sat down heavily in the chair Ecklie had just vacated and looked at the file. Then at the photo that lay flat on his desk, the glass catching the light and obscuring the picture. Picking it up, he licked his lips and drew in a shaky breath. He ran his thumb over the glass as he placed his head in his other hand and gripped his forehead.

Miami international was busy this time of day with mid-morning travellers. Horatio stood amongst the people waiting for people, the air a-buzz with excitement. He was practically vibrating with it, standing in tan slacks and a white dress shirt. His hands fidgeted with his sunglasses and he found himself wishing that he had brought Grissom something. But his lover wasn't really a flowers kind of guy and all Horatio had to give was himself.

A grin that didn't quite show his teeth split his face the second he caught sight of Grissom. He waited for Grissom to notice him, for his face to fill with the light it always held when Grissom saw him the first time after a long absence. Their eyes met. Grissom's face darkened.

Horatio's smile faltered and faded as they walked towards one another, Grissom stopping just short and letting Horatio take the last few steps.

He reached for Grissom. "What's wrong?"

Grissom avoided the touch with a short step backward. "We need to go some place and talk."

Horatio frowned and looked at the floor before looking up at Grissom with his head still down slightly. "What's...what is-"

"Some place private. Your place would be best." Grissom turned and started towards the exit.

Horatio drew his hands up to his hips. They didn't rest on his gun or badge. Both had been left at home for once, for Grissom.

The drive was as silent as the killing field of a recent battle. Heavy and thick and not just with Miami moisture.

"Gil." Horatio tried. His mind was moving at speed but it had nowhere to go, nothing to work with. Something is wrong, he kept thinking.

"Just drive." Grissom's eyes were now hidden behind sunglasses for once and it frustrated Horatio. He knew, though, that his lover's eyes would look just as grey and dark beneath them as the lenses that hid them.

Grissom kicked off his shoes and immediately went to the kitchen, finding the bottle of 12 year old whiskey Horatio kept specifically for him. He grabbed a glass and poured himself three fingers worth of the amber liquid, corked the bottle and leaned against the counter. His eyes focused on the tile of the floor as he took his first sip.

Horatio stood just inside, shoes still on, hands on his hips. He had taken his glasses off and his eyes were filled with distress. But Grissom wouldn't look at him.

He took another sip and walked to his suit case, slipping out the file. Then he walked to the island in the middle of Horatio's kitchen and sat down on one of the stools surrounding it, placing the folder carefully in the middle of it.

Horatio walked to the island and saw that Grissom must not have slept in several days. There were bags under his bloodshot eyes.

"Is it Nick?" Horatio tried, knowing it wasn't. The problem, whatever it was, had something to do with himself.

Grissom just nodded at the folder. Horatio looked down at it and saw his name. His forehead creased as he picked it up and opened it. Nothing changed in his facial expression but he stopped breathing for a minute. His brain stopped spinning it's wheels and moved forward, making sense of the fear he felt, the fear that he had done something terribly wrong.

Wary eyes drifted up to meet the hard grey of Grissom's. "Where did you get this?" His words were guarded.

"Ecklie." Grissom took the tone he used in tense, dangerous situations. Low and quiet. "He's worried about the lab associating with you."

A feeling of guilt started to drip into Horatio's chest, cool and clammy, foreboding. Anger at Ecklie prickled the skin on the back of his neck also, not because he had called Horatio out but because of his timing. Grissom had been fragile before this. Now? He watched Grissom sip his whiskey.

"I trust you," Grissom whispered, like it was sensitive information, a secret that made him uneasy. "Why would you keep anything from me, I thought." Grissom shook his head a little, eyes staring at an indeterminate point as he laid out what he had been mulling over ever since Ecklie told him.

Horatio swallowed and looked down at the open file. This was never supposed to come up, it need never have been discussed.

"I mean, what could be so damaging that you would be afraid of what I might think about it? About what it might make me think of _you_." His voice was like a knife, sharp enough that it didn't hurt instantly, not until blood started to pulse to the surface.

Horatio closed his eyes. This wasn't happening.

"Come on! You have nothing for me?" Grissom's voice pitched a little high with his emotion as he shook his head at Horatio.

There was nothing he could say, Horatio felt, nothing left. He was still looking at the file, the picture of Riaz, as his mind spun back over the sight of Marisol bleeding, terrified. The vulnerability he had felt in that moment, how recklessly he had fallen for her without looking around. The writing was on the wall, he had been warned.

Grissom slammed his glass down and walked over to Horatio. He looked at the other man in profile and shook his head. "Go ahead, keep quiet. It's worked so well for you up to now."

Horatio's eyes flashed to Grissom's, a hard cobalt blue. Anger started to burn in Horatio, the kind of smouldering emotion that he feared because, like his father, he couldn't control the flash point. How could this insulated, only child ever understand? "You already think I'm a killer."

"You are a killer," Grissom leaned in and whispered ruthlessly. It was this type of carelessness he sometimes exercised in tense situations that would get him killed one day if he wasn't careful.

"Back off," Horatio snarled, forcing Grissom to retreat a step. He turned to face Grissom, throwing back his shoulders and raising to his full height. "It must be nice to have everything so black and white," Horatio said in a low growl.

"Black and white for me?" Grissom asked incredulously. "Clearly _you_ know right from wrong, so much so that when the _justice system_ screws up you decide to step in and clean up their mess." He snarled, eye teeth visible with the word 'justice'.

Horatio slowly shook his head. No one, not ever, would lecture him about justice and what he had done for Marisol. He was done talking.

Grissom saw this too and, chest heaving, he stuffed his feet into his shoes, grabbed his suit case and left.

Horatio stood stock still but, gradually, he began to tremble. He sat down at his desk and opened the drawer then slumped over it, keeping his eyes on the photo inside. His hand groped until it felt the velvet box next to the picture and held onto it. Inside was the plain silver band Marisol had been so excited about. All the gems in the world he would have gladly bought for her but she wanted the silver ring.

They were both looking for the same thing. In the photo, outside the courthouse. They were in love with the promise of each other to be there, the promise to keep things simple and in perspective. They had charged head first into love because they both knew that life was short. You had to find happiness where you came upon it then hold on.

He had held on for once, done something for himself. His hand worked the fabric of the box. He remembered the feeling of the knife going into Riaz, how it reminded him so much of being 16 again, standing over his father. That time, though, he was in control. Completely. As he stared down at Riaz bleeding out, Horatio's feelings left him. He was empty and it was a relief.

He looked up to the picture of him and Grissom and felt a pain in his chest. That had changed very suddenly with the chance meeting of the Vegas supervisor. Violently, he flipped the framed photograph down so he couldn't look at it. He leaned back in the chair, brought the small velvet box to his chest and held it there in a white knuckled fist. But he didn't cry.


	5. Chapter 5

The Miami crime lab went on with it's work the same as ever. Horatio gave everything he had to every case, relentless as always. Only Natalia and Calleigh noticed the difference in their supervisor. Something about him had changed in the last month, something subtle as it ever was when it came to Horatio.

Calleigh stopped him before he left the ballistics lab one afternoon. "Hey handsome, you care to join me for dinner tonight?"

Horatio cleared his throat, avoided her eyes. "Actually Calleigh, I...I can't tonight. Rain check?"

She cocked her head to the side. "Sure. You know if you ever need someone to talk to Horatio-"

"I know. Thank you Calleigh." He was gone, quickly as he had come and Calleigh stared after him with worry.

Slipping on her safety glasses and returning to the table, Calleigh caught an unfamiliar logo on a file in the corner of her eye. She looked at it, then slowly rmeoved her glasses again, laying them aside to pick up the folder. It was lying where Horatio had had a case file open moments ago.

It was imprinted with the logo of the Las Vegas Police Department. Knowing she probably shouldn't, Calleigh opened it and read the contents anyway. She looked up and stared into nothing, her mind adding another piece to the puzzle.

She found Eric in the locker room sitting on a bench a few hours later and straddled the bench next to him, folder in hand. The smile she gave him was one he knew well.

"What do you need Calleigh?" He asked as he buttoned up his shirt.

"I think I need a really big favour from you."

He looked up and saw that her smile was gone, her face suddenly very serious.

"Actually, I think Horatio might need a really big favour from you." She handed him the folder.

Eric scanned it, his face darkening. "Why do you have this?"

Calleigh put a hand on his arm. "I didn't. Horatio did."

Eric looked up at her, eyes narrowed.

"And I think he got it from someone at the Las Vegas lab."

Shaking his head, Eric said "Why would someone in Vegas have this?"

Calleigh brushed a lock of long blond hair behind her ear and thought about how to proceed with the explanation of her hunch. "Have you noticed a change in Horatio this last year?"

His mind flipped back through every interaction he had had with his supervisor and friend in the last year. Eric shrugged his well muscled shoulders. "He's had a weird year with Kyle, right, but...no, he's just seemed like H."

She had thought as much. "Did you know he was seein' someone?"

Eric's eyebrows shot up. "Really? I had no idea." He smiled at the thought. Every once in a while he would worry that Horatio was holding on to Marisol too much to move on.

Calleigh bit her lip. "Well, I'm pretty sure something happened and they're...they're not seein' each other anymore. I think it happened recently."

"Calleigh, what does this have to do with Rio?" Eric's face returned to looking perplexed.

"Eric, I think someone might have given this information to the person Horatio was seeing. I think it might have caused the rift."

His eyes drifted over the photo of Riaz.

Waiting a moment to collect her thoughts, Calleigh launched into her next sentence as if afraid she could not complete it. "I don't know what happened down there Eric. No one does besides you and Horatio and I would never ask you this if I didn't...if I didn't think it was deeply important to Horatio."

He looked up at her, face clouded and defensive, but he was still listening.

"I think you should go and talk to the person he was seeing and explain it." There. She asked. She asked knowing exactly how sensitive the subject was for Eric.

There was no immediate response from him, he kept his eyes on the photo.

"He was seein' someone in Vegas?"

"Do you remember the supervisor of their lab who came through here-"

"A year ago." His eyes widened and he looked up at Calleigh. "Horatio is...is with him?"

Calleigh smiled and shrugged.

"Wow." Eric's mind couldn't put them together but then again, he had only met Grissom briefly. He wasn't sure he could even properly remember the man's face.

"You see why something like this would be problematic," Calleigh said after minute. "Problematic if you hadn't been there, if you didn't know Riaz."

Eric slowly nodded. "You think they broke up over this?"

"If I know Horatio he wouldn't have told anyone about this and...if someone tried to force him to talk about it, he wouldn't. It doesn't make him look good if you don't know the circumstances."

"So what, you want me to go and talk to this Grissom guy on your hunch?" His face was half amused, half painfully serious.

Calleigh looked pensively at the metal locker doors as she spoke, face full of concern. "He's been different the last month and I couldn't figure out quite what it was." She looked back to Eric. "He was the happiest I'd ever seen him this last year, Eric. You should'a heard him talk about this guy."

He looked up to the ceiling.

"Please Eric. For Horatio."

~~~~#~~~~

The change in the Vegas lab was palpable. It wasn't that Grissom let what had happened between him and Horatio affect his work per se. Any joviality that had resulted from happiness of the relationship was simply gone. He didn't laugh, he didn't smile. Cases would so engross him that he would forget requests made of him, by his superiors and his team. It was the team that was worried at the abrupt change in their leader though, his superiors thought he was simply being absent minded.

Catherine knew better. She saw the change that overcame him the day before he left for Miami. Something had happened and she was agitated that Grissom had yet to talk to her about it.

She was about to head to his office when an incredibly beautiful man with skin the colour of milk chocolate walked by. Around Nick's age, he walked confidently in the direction the receptionist had pointed him, the same direction Catherine was heading. She followed him, allowing her gaze to drift over his body, noting the way his clothes shifted around his muscles.

She stopped short when Grissom came into view and the man stopped infront of him. Warrick came to stand by her side, a cup of coffee to his lips.

Grissom had been speaking with Sara outside his office and both now looked up to the waiting Cuban. "Can I help you?" Grissom's tone was slightly impatient, his look a frown as he tried to remember where he knew this man from.

"Doctor Grissom, I'm Eric Delko from the Miami crime lab. We met a while ago." Eric's face was full of conflict too too. He didn't like this situation. He also didn't like the thought of Horatio sitting at home alone at night.

Grissom's eyes narrowed behind his glasses. "If this is regarding a case, Mr. Delko, you could have picked up the phone," he said callously.

Sara's eyes lifted as she slowly backed away from the two men. Grissom hadn't been outwardly hostile to anyone yet, but he was approaching an angry space and she didn't want to be around when he got there.

Delko shook his head, frowning. "I need a private word with you."

Grissom pursed his lips and stared Eric down for a minute before opening the door to his office and following Eric through it.

"I want to have a private word with him," Catherine said as her eyes followed Delko.

"Oh yeah?" Warrick looked at her with a sceptical grin.

"Oh, _yeah_."

Sitting down behind his desk, Grissom looked at Eric with undisguised impatience but said nothing. There was something in that immobile look that reminded Eric of Horatio.

Clearing his throat as he sat down, Eric rubbed his hands on his pants before speaking. "I'm here to speak with you about Lieutenant Caine." He used Horatio's official title because to him, this man didn't know Horatio.

"I suspected as much." Grissom said smoothly, refusing to give Eric anything.

"He doesn't know I'm here," Eric said as he fished into the soft briefcase he had brought and pulled out a picture. "I was with him in Rio. Marisol was my sister." He said it quickly, laying the picture of the wedding day on the table.

Grissom picked up the photo and studied it. The first thing that caught his eye was the fact that Horatio was wearing a tie. If that wasn't love... The woman in the photo was beautiful, just shy of 35, maybe younger. She had her hands wrapped around Horatio's arm, her head resting on his shoulder. There was adoration there, unstaged because the picture was not taken by a professional, Grissom could tell.

Horatio's face held the calm and relaxed expression Grissom remembered from nights they spent together, just being. It was clear he had felt strongly for this woman.

Finally there was Delko, standing beside Horatio, his hand on the older man's shoulder, smiling brightly.

"You had some part in that man's death, too," Grissom stated when he looked up from the picture.

Eric shook his head. "I was there but H would never let me get my hands dirty on a piece of garbage like Riaz, even if I wanted to. And I did."

"Is this what you came here to say?" The impatience was creeping back into his tone.

"I came to say...we went to Rio to kill Antonio Riaz because he was never going to serve his sentence there. They were never going to hold him."

"And you think that gave you the right to take his life." Grissom felt the anger of the confrontation he had with Horatio over this seeping back.

Eric shook his head, a mirthless smile on his face. "You don't get it. If Riaz were still alive, everyone in our lab, you, Kyle...we'd all be in danger. He said he wouldn't stop until he took everything from H." He swallowed, frowning at the thought. "We didn't...we didn't know how far he would go to do that until..."

Grissom cast his eyes down.

"When we got there," Eric continued, sprinting towards the finish of this painful recollection, "we found Riaz had beaten his brother Ray to death. Riaz had co-opted him into his drug business...just like he co-opted Horatio's nephew."

The two men's eyes met. Eric saw that Grissom knew exactly how important Jay jr. was to Horatio.

"And when we finally caught up to him, he pulled the knives. He came after us. H had refused to kill Riaz before...and that probably eats at him every minute of every day...but he didn't then." Eric's breath came in shaky spurts. "That's what I came to tell you."

He rose quickly and went to the door, turning with one last thought. "He didn't tell me about you...because he knows Mari was...so important to me. I guess he was afraid I would think he was being unfaithful to her but the truth is, she would want him to be happy." His breathing became more uneven as he said this. "And Calleigh says he's never been happier than he was this last year and she thinks that's because of you." He pulled his lips over his teeth, moistening them.

"If our actions made you doubt his character then, I'm here to tell you he's beyond reproach. He is a good man."

"All of this...getting shot by someone who was after him, your sister...you don't regret that she married him?" Grissom had to ask this brutal question of this man who came to defend Horatio. He needed to know how it was that one could trust the walking contradiction that was Horatio Caine.

Eric shook his head. "He was my brother a long time before he married Mari." Eric said simply. "He would have...and has done the same for me."

Grissom spun his chair so he was looking to the side of the room. "Why didn't you just pick up the phone, Delko?" He asked.

Eric smirked and waited until Grissom looked over at him one last time. "He's worth a trip to Vegas. He's worth a lot." He left the office, shutting the door behind him and leaning against it to collect his thoughts before he walked out.

Grissom picked up the photo from his desk and stared at it.

~~~~#~~~~

Kyle sat next to his father on the couch, casting glances his way in-between watching the basketball game. His father looked focused on Chris Duhon, the point guard currently making life hell for the Warriors. But somehow Kyle could tell Horatio wasn't paying attention to the game, even though it was amazing. This was the type of basketball game that Horatio would recount to his son in vivid detail, laying out every nuance with enthusiasm. Or, as much enthusiasm as Horatio was really capable of showing.

But his blue eyes were far away and they had been like this for a month. Kyle hadn't truly understood what an affect Grissom had had on his father's state of mind until now. Nothing had been said to him but Kyle was quick on the uptake. He knew things were rocky to non-existent between his father and Grissom right now.

He clicked off the television and sat with the remote in his hand, staring forward. Horatio looked over.

"Why hasn't Gil come around?" Kyle looked over at his dad, distress in his young blue eyes.

Horatio cleared his throat and looked down. "Um..."

"Come on dad, something happened. Why didn't you say something to me?" Kyle could never understand the way his father avoided talking about painful or upsetting things.

"It's just that...well, Gil learned something about me he didn't like. We haven't really been speaking, Kyle." He hadn't thought Kyle would notice, that his inscrutable demeanour could hide his thoughts and fears from even his own son.

Kyle was sensitive though. "Did he learn some things about you or did you fail to mention some important stuff to him?" Kyle stared at him pointedly, his expression said 'cut the crap'.

Horatio smiled, half in discomfort, half pleased at just how astute his son could be.

"Because you do that dad. You don't keep things from people specifically you just...keep them to yourself...all the time." The look he gave his father now hurt Horatio a little. Kyle was not just speaking of Horatio and Grissom's relationship, he was talking about their relationship too. "It makes it really hard to..."

"I..." He had to find the words amongst the pain his son's blunt statements had caused. "I know son, I do and..."

"I'm right, aren't I? You just need to talk to him." Kyle leaned forward and nodded in certainty at his own conclusion.

"I'm not certain he's interested in listening, Kyle." His father's voice was rough like usual but there was pain there. The sadness Kyle thought he could see here and there, he wasn't imagining it.

He looked at his father and shook his head. "Well you should try. You should tell him everything big you never told him before, even if he doesn't listen." He screwed up his face. "It's better than being depressed like this."

Eventually he flipped the TV back on in frustration when he saw his father could or would not respond.

Horatio looked at his son a long while, wondering vaguely what he would think if he learned everything there was to know about his father. Sighing, he stood and briefly touched the soft golden hairs on Kyle's head before climbing the stairs. He picked up the phone off the cradle on his night stand and looked at it. How many times had he dialled Grissom's number on this handset, like second nature.

The crisply made bed looked benign but the sight of it made Horatio uneasy. Easily prone to nightmares, he had found the quality of his sleep improving when Grissom was with him. Aside from the one incident after Nick's case, he had never had a nightmare sleeping next to Grissom.

But they came all the time now, just like before. The painful demons he could not share with anyone letting him know that, one way or another, they would get their exercise.

His thumb ran over the black jelly buttons but did not dial.

_'Don't ever do anything like that again. I might not be able to forgive you a second time.'_ Those had been Grissom's words. Horatio had no doubt it was true. There were only so many times one could cross that line and expect to be forgiven.

He knew he wouldn't dial that number again.


	6. Chapter 6

"Grissom?"

He looked slowly up from the review form he had been writing on. His focus had been unshakeable lately. Even his desk was devoid of the usual piles of paperwork.

Catherine sat down in a chair facing him and laced her fingers, looking at Grissom appraisingly.

He raised an eyebrow and tilted his head. "Did you need something?" There was nothing deliberate in the shortness of his tone, but it was there never the less.

"Yeah, I need my friend back. He's been missing for about a month, have you seen him? Races cockroaches, neglects paperwork..." She raised her eyebrows at him, as good as saying he better not feed her a line.

Grissom sighed and removed his glasses, leaning back in his chair. "I've been meaning...I should have talked to you Catherine."

"Hey, I know that. Start talking now." Her voice was gentle.

Eyes narrowing, Grissom placed two fingers on his lips as he gathered his thoughts. The way he told the story, Catherine could tell he had removed himself from any emotion regarding it, like it was a case to be worked and left at the end of the day.

"I'm guessing that's what Delko was doing here."

Grissom leaned on his desk. "Yeah. Flew all the way to tell me...to tell me why, I guess."

Their eyes stayed locked throughout the conversation, the trust they shared absolute. Grissom hadn't talked to Catherine about it because he didn't want to talk about it, not because he didn't want to talk to her. The blonde understood this.

"It doesn't change what he did." Grissom looked pensive. "How can I not question what kind of person he is after this?"

Catherine gave him a patient look. "Grissom, you were seeing him for a year. You know what kind of person he is, you do."

She watched sadness creep into his face.

"That's why you're so damn morose." A vague smile parted her lips in clarity, "you still love him. He killed someone and you still love him." Catherine hit the nail on the head, she could tell from Grissom's expression. "Oh, Christ Gil," she said gently, "both of us have taken a life-"

"How can you say that like it's the same thing?" He looked at her with incredulous distress. "You shot someone to save me. I shot someone to save a child. We didn't...hunt down someone we felt had wronged us and stab them to death," he said quickly. He looked at her and saw that she didn't share his opinion.

Catherine rubbed her palms together, looked about the room to gather her thoughts and drawing on her patience. "Imagine the people you care about the most. Your mother, Horatio...me." Grissom smiled briefly at her.

"Imagine someone took one of us from you...and then they walked. You're telling me the thought wouldn't even cross your mind?"

In Catherine's eyes, Grissom saw the uncompromising love of a mother. He looked down at his fingers laced over his stomach, uncertain. His face clouded over. "How can I know?

Catherine shrugged. "Maybe you should think about that." She rose, tugging down the bottom of her dark, denim jacket. "Maybe you should catch a plane," she said with raised eyebrows.

~~~~#~~~~

Billie Holiday played softly on the stereo of Horatio's condo. He was laid out on his couch with an arm slung over his face. The Miami sun was dying, his stomach was rumbling and there were no lights on in the house. His focus was on nothing, trying to capture it and hold onto it so that his mind couldn't stray to other places. It was almost working except when he started to drift off to sleep and would start dreaming about dancing to the music. Dancing with Grissom in that safe space they had created between them in those moments, surrounded by music.

Then he would startle himself with a violent twitch, the kind that happen in the moment before true sleep, and have to start all over again. He was tempted not to answer the door when the knock came. The chances of it being Calleigh or Alexx, coming by to check on him, were good. All he wanted was to forget and talking about it didn't allow his brain to compartmentalize the pain and shove it somewhere it wouldn't be found for a while.

Thinking about how it wasn't very kind to ignore the worry of two of his closest friends, Horatio dragged himself from the couch on the second knock and went to the door. Unlocking the deadbolt as he ran a hand through his no doubt dishevelled hair, Horatio suddenly found himself staring at Grissom.

The somewhat shorter man looked up at Horatio and for a moment, there was no emotion on either of their faces. As if their brains refused to process that split second and tell them what to do.

Horatio looked down and leaned against the doorway with one arm. Cast his eyes up from underneath his brow.

"May I come in?" Grissom asked softly, hands in his jacket.

A rumbling sound came from Horatio's chest as he tried to make his throat work. He was dehydrated as well. "Yes," he finally managed, stepping aside to let Grissom enter.

As he kicked off his shoes, Grissom's hand found the light switch and turned it on. Horatio blinked a few times in the glare. Unsure of himself, Grissom sat down on the couch with his coat still on and looked up at Horatio.

The red head was leaning on the door with his palm pressed against it. He was looking at Grissom and thinking about what Kyle and said. Thinking about what he needed to say.

This was a second chance. Looking at Grissom as his heart ached for missing the man, Horatio wanted to deliver. Grissom saw how soft and apprehensive Horatio's eyes were, containing none of the anger of their last argument.

"I...can't say I shouldn't have killed Riaz. I can't." There was no challenge in Horatio's words.

"Eric came and saw me." Grissom stated.

This threw Horatio. He frowned and looked about for a minute. "He..."

"He told me everything about...about Rio." Grissom also wasn't challenging. He wanted them to talk. He needed them to talk. "I can't..."

"I know you can't condone it-" Horatio tried to say.

"No, I can't put myself in your place," Grissom said quickly. "I can never know what it must have been been like...I can't." He looked down at his hands.

That was something, Horatio thought.

"What you did...we spend our lives putting people like you behind bars, people who think they're above the law." Grissom looked up at him, not accusatory but conflicted.

Chest tightening at that, Horatio looked to the floor. "You think I belong behind bars?"

Grissom barked a hollow laugh. "No. The problem is I don't know what to think, Horatio." And it was true. Looking up at Horatio, as docile looking as he ever was when they were alone, Grissom new his feelings toward him hadn't changed because of this. "The problem is I love you."

Horatio couldn't fight the small tug at the corner of his mouth, as painful as that sentence was to hear. "Well...no one ever really wants to hear that, do they?"

The tiniest of smiles ruffled the hair of Grissom's beard.

Every muscle in Horatio's body tightened as his mind played out what he needed to do. His breathing and heart rate increased, Horatio could feel it. "I don't...I don't know where we're gonna go...with this. But Kyle gave me some advice and I should really take it." He spoke uncertainly as he walked up the stairs, Grissom's eyes following him.

He returned from his bedroom with what Grissom recognized as an x-ray folio and placed it on the coffee table.

"What are these?" Grissom spoke softly.

"Open it," He said in his quiet gravel, sitting down next to Grissom.

Grissom flipped the file open, his eyes immediately taking note of the fact that these were x-rays of Horatio, taken almost 20 years prior in connection with the Resden case. As he looked over the bones with a coroners eye, he caught it. Caught _them_.

Thickening of the bone in several different areas of the long bones, especially along the humerus, radius and ulna of both arms. The same could be seen on several ribs and on the left side of the mandible and maxilla. It was evidence of severe trauma, old trauma.

He looked up at Horatio, sitting opposite from him but staring into the space between them, his breathing forced to be level in an obvious way. No one would ever know to look at the man. His fair skin, his soft eyes, his unshakable composure.

Grissom's lips parted for a second. There was something to be said here but he didn't know what. How many years on the job and he didn't know what to say.

"If you're wondering...if the arm fractures were spiral, they were." Horatio nodded. "When he finished with my mother..." His face was emotionless until he said this and winced. It took a minute for him to regain his poise. "When he was finished beating her, if he heard Ray or I crying...we'd be next."

Grissom looked at Horatio with a mixture of horror and disbelief. He had suspected that the elder Caine was a poor excuse for a father, he just hadn't known how true that was.

"I don't drink whiskey because he did. It always happened when he was drunk and...when he'd sober up he'd apologize. My mother and Ray they...they always wanted to believe him." He shook his head. "I couldn't."

Grissom went to place his hand on Horatio's knee but was stopped by Horatio. "I'm not done yet."

"Horatio, you don't have to-" He tried to speak knowing there was nothing he could do. This was old damage, done in Horatio's most formative years.

"I do. I do." Horatio insisted, his breathing laborious. "I need to tell you that I found her when I came home early from school on July second at 1:32. On the floor in her own blood. Knife from the kitchen lying beside her. I have her eyes...and the only way I remember her's is from that day, empty." The tone of his voice was so odd as he spoke this, a little too high.

Grissom wrung his hands and looked at the floor, clenched his jaw.

"My dad was watching TV, his arms covered in blood. I always stayed calm around him because he would feed off of fear...or upset." Horatio held open his right palm and traced a thin scar that travelled across his middle and trigger fingers. "But I was screaming when I stabbed him."

Horatio looked aside to Grissom, so many conflicting emotions in his face, in his glacial blue eyes. The fight to control himself was being lost. "I...I never told anyone before." He shook with the tears he wouldn't let out but didn't take his eyes from Grissom. "And I needed you to know...that I had given you everything, I swear." He finished in a whisper as Grissom pulled him to his chest fiercely.

Tears formed and spilled, one by one, down Grissom's face as Horatio kept repeating "I swear there's nothing else," over and over into his shoulder. Tears shed for the child this man had been, the man life had forced him to become, the life they were making together when the truth of it all came crashing down. Grissom rocked him gently, feeling Horatio's arm wrap around his waist and squeeze hard as he shook.

~~~~#~~~~

Grissom was using the arm rest of the couch as a backrest so Horatio could lean back against him. The first five buttons of Horatio's shirt were undone so Grissom's hand could rest on the pale skin of his chest, an inch from his much slowed heart. His other arm was curled around Horatio, his lips pressed to the skewed red locks. Horatio's hand was over Grissom's through his shirt.

"You gotta let me in," Grissom whispered, his lips brushing Horatio's temple. His eyes squeezed shut. "And you gotta keep me there, Horatio, God," he exclaimed quietly, "how has this not killed you?"

Horatio looked up at Grissom as best he could considering their position, his eyelids drooping. "I'm glad your father was a good man. That your mother was strong." His voice was weak and his head drifted down to rest on his chest after that.

"Did you hear me?" Grissom whispered. But only a soft rumble from Horatio's chest answered him. He was asleep.

~~~~#~~~~

Grissom wasn't tired. He held onto Horatio with the same attention he had watched Nick, afraid lest any new harm should come to him. The beat of Horatio's heart on his palm was reassuring in it's rhythm.

His mind strayed to the small velvet box in his luggage. He had been carrying it around since the day he bought the ring. Staring at the length of Horatio stretched out on top of him, Grissom knew this was it. Nothing could tear him from this man's side, not ever again.

He smirked as he thought about the amount of work it was all going to take, considering where Horatio's communication problems arose from.

"I love you," he whispered, feeling the fierce strength of it that burned in his chest.

Keys would be heard in the door a moment before Kyle entered. He stood still a moment when he caught sight of the two men before he smiled at Grissom. Grissom smiled back.

"Hey Kyle."

"Hey Gil."

They both spoke softly, Kyle not wanting to wake his father any more than Grissom did. There wasn't much to worry about in that case though, Horatio was sleeping incredibly soundly.

"Hungry?" Kyle asked.

Grissom inclined his head. "I don't know how much luck we're going to have," he said with a nod in the direction of the fridge.

Smiling, Kyle reached outside and picked up a couple grocery bags. Grissom chuckled softly at the sight as Kyle brought them in and started to unpack.

Blinking slowly, Horatio looked at the light in the kitchen as his mind finished the leap to consciousness. He sat up quickly but found himself constrained by Grissom's arms. The touch caused him to turn, his face an inch from Grissom's. The panic in his eyes disappeared. "I thought I dreamed..." He started.

"Yeah? Well I'm here," Grissom whispered while giving him a warm smile. He kissed Horatio's forehead.

Frowning at the sound of something frying in the kitchen, Horatio turned and saw Kyle.

"Hey dad. You were really out there."

Grissom extracted himself and went to the kitchen, returning with a glass of water which he handed to Horatio. Downing it, he set it down as Grissom knelt in front of him, looking him over.

"You okay?" He asked, running a hand through Horatio's hair.

"Yes...I do feel exhausted." They shared an intimate gaze, pupils meeting and searching.

"What were you two up to this afternoon?" Kyle said, implying something to lighten the mood.

"Planning our joint storming of the go-kart track. That kind of planning can really take it out of a person, you know." Grissom responded without missing a beat, his eyes never leaving Horatio's.

Kyle laughed as he placed cans into cupboards. "We'll see about that."

Grissom stood and went to the door, slipping on his shoes.

"Um," Horatio swallowed, looking fearful, "are you going?"

Grissom looked up at him and shook his head. "My suitcase is in the car. I should also phone Ecklie...let him know I'll be taking some time off." He opened the door and walked outside.

Horatio exhaled the breath he felt he'd been holding for a month, letting his head hang between his shoulders. He wasn't a praying man but he believed in being thankful. He was thankful for second chances. Silently, he vowed to earn this one.


End file.
